BUILT ENCINITAS YMCA PROGRAMS

Rollie Ayers would throw a handkerchief in the air at the start of each campfire skit during YMCA campouts and tell kids to scream until it fell to the ground. He’d keep at it until every last child was bellowing at the top of his lungs.

Mr. Ayers rounded up support and enthusiasm for the YMCA and its programs in Encinitas for nearly 50 years.

He helped build the YMCA in Encinitas from the ground up in the early 1960s, starting in a small house on Third Street when it was the North Coast Family YMCA. It is now known as Magdalena Ecke Family YMCA and has grown to serve thousands of families.

Mr. Ayers, who was instrumental in developing the YMCA’s Aquatic Park in Carlsbad, died April 4 after suffering a heart attack at his home in Encinitas. He was 80.

He came to Encinitas in 1963 from the Hollywood YMCA, where he worked for almost a decade, and interviewed for a job at the new YMCA, but he didn’t accept it at first, because there were no facilities and few programs. The next day after he returned home, he got a visit from Paul Ecke Jr. who convinced him to take the job.

Mr. Ayers organized the Y’s first surfing contest at Moonlight Beach and started other outdoor activities to get the community involved.

“When he got an idea, he could pull together people,” said longtime friend Van Bechtel.

In the mid-1960s, he worked with board members to create the Aquatic Park center east of the I-5 at the Agua Hedionda Lagoon. “He loved the outdoors and wanted children to get outdoors and swim, play and go boating and camping,” said friend Jim Kinghorn.

Kinghorn recalled how Ayers would lead children in campfire skits and songs like “Little Teepee in the Woods” and draw out even the shyest youngsters.

“His warmth would make you want to join what he did,” Kinghorn said. The kids returning as adults would say the skits he organized helped them gain confidence.

“He put his time and soul into the YMCA,” said friend Tom Bergkamp. “He sparked everything and was instrumental in getting many people involved to build it.”

Mr. Ayers worked as the first executive director until 1972 when the YMCA was at its current Saxony Road location on five acres donated by the Ecke family. After he left the YMCA to join Great American Bank in San Diego as senior vice president and director of community relations, he continued to support the YMCA, serving on the board and volunteering. In the early 1970s, when the YMCA was starting construction of the first building and pool, Mr. Ayers helped create “Roof Raisers” to raise money to pay for the roof on the first YMCA building. Roof Raisers became an annual event that he continued to support for decades.

Ralston Elmer Ayers was born January 25, 1932, in Los Angeles to Ralston Ayers and Dorothy Oury. He attended Los Angeles City College and graduated from Los Angeles State College in 1954 with a bachelor’s degree in recreation/education.

He married Tanya Tichenko in 1955 and had three sons, subsequently getting divorced after 19 years. In 1985, he married Judy Pyke. They divorced in 1995.

Mr. Ayers is survived by three sons, Bill of Redmond, Wash., Ken and Bob, both of Encinitas; two stepbrothers, Tom Oury of Lakewood and Dick Oury of Portland, Ore.; companion Kay Hale of Poway; and two grandsons.

Mr. Ayers, twice named Rotarian of the Year, took dinner to the homebound in Encinitas for Meals-on-Wheels over 12 years.

Private services were held at his home. A communitywide gathering in his honor is scheduled for 4:30 p.m. July 29 at the Magdalena Ecke Family YMCA in Encinitas. The family suggests donations to the Magdalena Ecke Family YMCA, Mexican-American Educational Guidance Association (MAEGA) and Meals On Wheels.